Zoe pulled Luca aboard the Specter.
Luca's hand was cramped around the lted energy cell fragnt, knuckles white, the edges of the slag biting into his palm. He tumbled over the roll cage and collapsed into the passenger seat, gasping, his legs still tingling from the run.
Pixel materialized in the back, amber eyes tracking sothing to the east. Her fur rippled in that way it did when she sensed danger. Which, given the circumstances, was less helpful than usual.
"You good?" Zoe asked.
"I'll let you know."
And now helicopters were coming.
Luca counted them through his visor's magnification. Twelve. No, fourteen, and they weren't helicopters. TL8 gunships, rotorless designs with active blowers that humd, pushing hot air trails behind them, their energy weapons already tracking targets below. System Store hardware. Enough equipnt in the air that would bankrupt most adventuring companies.
Behind them, the dust cloud of the ground convoy resolved into individual shapes. APCs. Combat vehicles. System Store armored hardware with energy based mounted weapons.
The UER military used Apaches and Abrams tanks. Soldiers carried M16s and conventional rifles. Not because the System Store didn't sell better, but because better cost ten tis as much and the UER was stretched across three continents. Amazonia. Europe. The Asian theater. Troops and logistics everywhere, which ant conventional hardware wherever they could get away with it.
Orion Horizons didn't have that problem.
Every vehicle in that convoy was TL8. Every weapon, every piece of armor, every gunship in the air. The kind of investnt that made a statent: We have money, and we're not afraid to spend it. Even the IFC hadn't poured this much into ground vehicles and transports. Karen preferred to invest in ships and orbital infrastructure.
Luca didn't know what Orion was after. But he knew a flex when he saw one.
All of it branded with the sa logo.
Orion Horizons.
"Convenient timing," Luca muttered. "Really, really convenient timing."
Zoe brought the Specter up and banked hard, putting distance between them and the portal. Creatures stread past beneath them, glass-scaled bodies catching the morning light, all of them fleeing the corrupted zone in an endless river of teeth and claws. Level 15s, mostly. A few 17s mixed in. Still dangerous to anyone caught on foot without proper gear.
Orion's helicopters split into two groups. Half peeled off toward the creature stream, door gunners opening up with heavy weapons that turned the morning into a light show. The other half continued toward the portal site, descending in coordinated patterns around the corrupted zone.
They had firepower, and lots of it, which ant this situation was either about to get a lot easier or a lot more complicated.
"Where do you want to go?" Zoe asked.
Luca looked at the fragnt in his hand, then up at the sky where Ryan's Poorwill drones still circled, their tiny forms nearly invisible against the dawn as they recorded everything.
"Stay near the portal," he said. "Thirty feet up. Let them co to us."
Zoe banked the Specter back toward the corrupted zone. Below them, creatures continued streaming from the portal, but at this altitude they were safe from the stampede. The Orion gunships were already engaging, energy bolts painting the desert floor with flashes of blue-white light.
The ground convoy fanned out across the western approach. Tanks rolled into firing positions, their turrets tracking the creature stream with chanical precision. Not Abrams. Sothing that looked like it belonged in a video ga. Low-slung hulls that hugged the ground, angular faceted armor like a stealth fighter on treads and main guns that glowed blue at the barrel.
The lead tank fired.
The energy lance punched through the stampede and detonated on impact, carving a crater fifteen feet wide and scattering glass-scaled bodies in every direction. A second tank fired. A third. Each shot turned a section of the creature stream into a smoking hole in the ground, the concussive blasts rolling across the desert like thunder.
They had the overflow contained in minutes, a display of firepower that would have taken the UER ten tis the personnel to match.
TL8 hardware made a difference.
The Specter settled into a hover forty feet above the debris field, close enough to see the portal's violent undulation.
Below, Orion personnel in combat armor deployed across the site. Their movents were coordinated in a way that spoke to serious training, and Luca recognized the type imdiately: security contractors. So of them were already moving toward the debris field where the burst rig had been, and they sure as hell weren't investigating.
A ground vehicle approached, stopping beneath them. A man stepped out, adjusting the straw cowboy hat that had no business being worn with dium armor, and looked up at the hovering Specter.
Luca recognized him imdiately. Samuel Keane, Orion's Director of Operations, with the sa unblinking stare and the sa gravel voice. He wore dium armor instead of a suit now, the plates sitting on him like he'd been born in them, but his eyes hadn't changed. Cold and calculating and missing whatever made people blink.
"Well now. Captain Rossi." Keane's voice carried up to them, each word slow and deliberate. "This is a pleasant surprise. Why don't you co on down so we can talk?"
"I'm good up here." Luca leaned over the roll cage. "What brings Orion Horizons all the way out here?"
"The overflow." Keane gestured at the chaos around them, creatures still streaming past, gunships firing in the distance. "Heard the distress calls and ca runnin'." He spread his hands. "We're here to help."
Right. Because Orion Horizons was famous for its humanitarian impulses.
"This site's under Orion control now," Keane continued. "We got contracts with the UER for portal managent across the Texas-Florida corridor. Figured we'd extend that authority here till the situation's handled."
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"Texas-Florida." Luca kept his face neutral. "We're in Arizona."
"Neighbors help neighbors. I'm sure you understand."
Luca understood perfectly. Orion was seizing the site and daring anyone to stop them.
"Funny thing," Luca said. "This area is managed by Ironwood Expeditions. They have the regional contract for the Sonoran Desert portals. Where are they?"
Sothing flickered across Keane's face. There and gone, faster than a blink he didn't make.
Keane tsked. "Ironwood." He spread his arms, gesturing at the empty desert, the chaos, the creatures streaming past, the gunships that all wore Orion's logo. "Don't see 'em anywhere, do you?" His lips curved into sothing that wasn't quite a smile. "But here we are."
Luca kept his expression neutral. Ironwood was probably up north, keeping Tucson safe from the creature streams that had been heading that way all night. The contract holder, doing their job. While Orion showed up at the source with enough firepower to hide whatever they wanted hidden.
"Sha about the overflow," Keane said, as if reading his thoughts. "UER lost good soldiers last night. Civilians too, from what I hear. Terrible thing." His expression didn't change. "Don't you worry. Orion's gonna get to the bottom of it."
"I bet you will."
Keane's eyes dropped to Luca's hand. To the fragnt clutched there.
"What you got there, Captain?"
"Evidence." Luca didn't move. "Of sabotage."
The silence stretched while the battle continued around them, gunships firing and creatures dying as Orion personnel established their periter and their clean-up crews moved steadily toward the debris field.
"Sabotage." Keane rolled the word around like he was tasting it. "Now that's a mighty heavy accusation, Captain. Slag like that's hard to trace." He nodded toward his personnel. "Without proper forensics, it's just debris. Lucky for everyone, we brought a team."
"It's quite a piece of evidence." Luca held up the fragnt, letting the morning light catch the lted slag, the partial serial numbers still visible on the surface. "Type-E power cells. Dozens of them. Wired together in a configuration designed to discharge their entire capacity in microseconds. Aid directly at a stable portal." He lowered his hand. "Soone turned that portal critical on purpose."
Keane didn't blink. Did lizards blink?
"Chain of custody's a funny thing," he said quietly. "Evidence gets contaminated. Moved. Lost." He glanced at his personnel, still advancing toward the debris field. "Hate to see anything compromise a proper investigation."
"I'm sure you wouldn't."
Another wave of creatures surged from the portal. Level 15s and 17s, glass-scaled bodies catching the light as they fled the corrupted zone. Orion's gunners opened fire, energy bolts turning the morning into chaos.
In the back seat, Pixel's rumble deepened. Her hackles rose. Sothing else was coming.
Keane seed not to notice. His attention stayed fixed on Luca.
"Noticed your camo's down, Captain. Power cells runnin' low, I reckon." He nodded toward the north, where the Triumph's distant silhouette was barely visible on the horizon. "Long walk back to your ship. And this overflow ain't done yet. Both portals still goin' strong."
Luca almost smiled. The Specter's cells were fine. Shields charged, engines hot, enough juice to outrun anything Orion had on the ground. Keane was fishing, trying to figure out if Luca would spook.
Zoe's hand drifted toward her plasma dagger, a glint in her eye. Luca caught the movent in his peripheral vision and gave the smallest shake of his head. Not yet.
"We're not going anywhere," Luca said.
"That so?" Keane's voice dropped to that gravelly almost-whisper. "Well now, Captain, I'd think real hard about that. This here's Orion property now. Anything pulled off it belongs to us." He nodded at the fragnt. "Includin' whatever you got in your hand."
"This is evidence of sabotage. Five people died." Luca t those unblinking eyes. "I'm not handing it to the company that showed up to clean the scene."
Sothing shifted in Keane's expression. Not anger, not frustration. Sothing colder.
"Now look, Captain, we're all on the sa side here." The Texan drawl stretched each word out, unhurried and almost friendly, but sothing underneath made Luca's skin crawl. "Humanity's side. Sotis the best thing a man can do is step back and let the professionals work."
"I'll keep that in mind."
Keane stared at him for a long mont. Then he turned, signaling to his escorts.
"Sit tight, Captain. We ain't done talkin'."
He walked back toward the Orion periter. Luca could leave. The Specter could outrun anything Orion had here. But leaving ant abandoning the debris field to Keane's cleanup crews, and Luca wanted to see what they were so eager to bury.
Pixel's growl intensified. Her ears swiveled toward the north.
"Luca." Zoe's voice was tight. "Sothing's coming from the Triumph."
He looked north and spotted an IFC signature approaching fast, hovering twenty feet above the terrain. He recognized it imdiately: the Centurion, that bulky armored box, coming in with the kind of purpose that ant Emily had sent backup.
The Centurion ca in fast, its magnetic lifters keeping it twenty feet off the ground as it decelerated toward the portal, high enough to stay clear of the creature stream below. The vehicle was overkill, a boxy armored transport the size of an RV that could hover over terrain most ground vehicles would struggle with.
It settled into position near the portal's edge, waiting for a gap in the stampede.
"Luca." Emily's voice ca through his comm, shredded by static from the corrupted portal but still intelligible. "We've got a delve team ready. Level 20s. They can stabilize the portal."
A delve team was the only real solution, killing the instability event at the source instead of fighting the endless creature stream forever. "Who's available?"
"Alessio's team."
Luca's stomach dropped.
"They're fresh," Emily continued, "geared up with TL9 from our armory. The cliff survivors are wrecked. Gabriela's people haven't slept in eighteen hours, and half of them are out of ammo." A burst of static, then: "He's ready, Luca. They all are."
His sixteen-year-old brother. Dad had grounded him for exactly this kind of reckless bullshit. Luca could still hear his father's voice from a dozen argunts over the years: You're not ready. It's too dangerous. Let handle it.
But the stream was surging again, another wave building. Orion's cleanup crews were moving toward the debris field, and if they didn't act now the overflow would hit its next phase. More creatures. More damage. More ti for Keane's people to make evidence disappear.
And Alessio was Level 20 for a level 15 portal. Properly equipped.
This is what Dad does, Luca thought. Holds on so tight he can't let go. Treats us like kids even when we're not.
He'd been sixteen when he started. They all had. Every mber of his crew had learned to fight by fighting, had leveled up by walking into portals that could have killed them. Alessio wasn't asking for permission he didn't need. He was asking for trust.
"Approved," Luca said. The word tasted like glass. "Send them in."
"Copy. Deploying."
Zoe brought the Specter lower, closer to the Centurion's position. Through the armored vehicle's viewports, Luca could see Chris at the controls and Emily turning away from the cockpit, heading back toward the cargo bay.
The rear ramp began to lower.
Alessio stood at the top of the ramp, his team behind him.
Seeing it was different from approving it. His brother in TL9 armor, plasma rifle in hand, about to sprint into an active overflow. Five teammates stood behind him, three guys and two girls around sixteen, System tags reading Level 20 and 21, all of them overleveled and overgeared for the content inside.
None of that made Luca feel better. He'd made the call. Now he had to live with it.
Movent from the Orion periter caught his eye. A team of six in heavy combat armor was moving toward the portal, and Keane was directing them with sharp gestures while his unblinking eyes tracked Alessio's team. Of course they wanted first crack at whatever unique gear the overflow might drop.
But Alessio's team was already at the ramp, young and fast and wearing lighter gear.
The Orion team tried to accelerate, but they were already too late.
The creature stream below thinned for a mont, leaving a gap in the stampede.
"Now," Emily said over the comm.
Alessio's team jumped.
They hit the ground running, weapons up, moving toward the portal in a tight formation. Luca watched his brother sprint across corrupted desert toward a crack in reality that was still vomiting monsters.
Pixel launched herself from the Specter.
Luca's heart seized as she dropped forty feet like a shadow, hitting the Centurion's roof with a thump that echoed through the comm before bounding off toward the portal. Another twenty feet to the ground, and she landed running, a blur of midnight fur that flickered visible for just a mont before her camouflage kicked back in.
She'd spent the last two months with Alessio. Of course she'd follow him. Cats did what cats did.
Alessio's team hit the portal at a full run, and a purple dot on Luca's display raced to catch up, reaching them just as they crossed the threshold.
The portal swallowed them all and froze in place.
Luca watched the place where his brother had been and reminded himself to breathe.
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